Chairman, Department of Livestock Production, University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Lahore Pakistan

Abstract
The ever increasing population of the world will require 70 to 100 % more food by mid of this century, so the animal breeders and geneticists have to adopt some latest interventions to provide improved livestock with little or no impact on environment and animal welfare. Selective breeding has been the source of improvement in livestock but molecular genetic revolution in the last decade of twentieth century led to the emergence of genomics. Molecular genetics did influence the breeding strategies by providing genetic maps, individual genes and QTLs related to performance traits in domestic livestock species. QTLs detection in animals led the shift from conventional selective breeding to marker assisted selection (MAS) and SNPs related to performance traits. Advancements in genomics led the animal breeder to formulate high density SNP chips comprising more than 50,000 to 80,000 SNPs covering the whole genome of livestock species. Selection on the basis of whole genome markers made selection of genetically superior animals at very early age and at the same time with the accuracy of 0.8 in predicting their breeding value. The SNP-chip analysis has been very popular in livestock in predicting breeding potential at early age, but some traits i.e. traits involving non-additive effects, epigenetic effects are still out of the reach of genomic selection. However advancements in the era of genomics will help in collecting more and more information about the animal genetics but concerns i.e. ethical, environmental, animal welfare and social values must be addressed.
Key words
Animal breeding, Advances, Challenges